Charlene
by SpiritoftheWhiteRose
Summary: Alright I got a lot of lip for the older version of the story so here it is renewed and revised. Charlene is an old friend of Artie's and the girl that I think should have been for him in the movie.
1. Charlene

**Alright I was getting a lot of beef for the first version of the story sound way to much like the movie so I'm reposting it, hopping that you wonderful critics will just get off my back on the matter. Same main idea, Arthur should have had a girl somewhere in the story. Enjoy!**

Charlene

Crash!

Lancelot collided with the boy standing in as the opponent. By the stone entrance a girl of fifteen winced at her friend's pain. Charlene wished day in and day out that the whole of the school would just leave the two of them alone. On the social ladder she and Arthur were the lowest of the low. They had life off the worst of all of the kids in the school.

Suddenly an ogre walked past her followed by a cat and mule. Charlene was terrified and then the beast stepped on Arthur! She ran from her spot and knelt beside him.

"Oh my goodness, are you alright."

Arthur groaned out, "Charlene?"

"Come on, let's got out of here before that ogre tries to kill us."

Charlene helped Arthur up to his feet and together they quickly walked off the field towards the auditorium. They heard a call behind them and Arthur turned to see the ogre and the other animals calling out his name. They sped up their pace and turned down a small corridor to elude the monster.

Charlene and Arthur used a back entrance and walked up a flight of stairs. Charlene heard a sound behind her and gasped. The two chess nerds grabbed her and Arthur and tossed them over the rail. How she'll probably never know. Arthur went over and Charlene got thrown right after him. Arthur got stuck on the coat of arms sitting above the entranceway and he managed to catch Charlene after the hem of her dress tore from hanging on the hooks.

"Arthur, you can let me down."

Unsurprisingly the whole school was pointing at them. She wondered what they could have possibly done now. When Arthur released her she was half caught and half shoved by the ogre to the side where she fell flat on her back.

"Please don't eat me."

Shrek pulled Artie off the coat of arms while the entire school was chanting for the ogre to do just that.

"I'm not here to eat him!"

Charlene wasn't completely shocked when everyone was disappointed.

"It's time to pack up your toothbrush and jamies, you're the new king of Far Far Away.

"What?"

Artie then remembered Charlene and stepped behind Shrek to help up his bewildered friend.

"Run that one by me again."

From the crowd came the unmistakable voice of Lancelot.

"Artie, a king? More like the mayor of Loserville."

And of course the auditorium was instantly filled with laughter.

"Is this for real?"

"Absolutely! Now clean out your locker kid you've got a kingdom to run.

Shrek started to steer Artie towards the door but then Artie said, "So wait. I'm really the only heir?"

Shrek thought this over for a second and, "The one and only."

Charlene bumped his arm from where she was standing and gave him a skeptical look.

Artie put his hand on Charlene and told Shrek, "Give me… uh… just a second."

Charlene reached out for his arm to pull him back, but Artie was already out of reach and making his way towards the center of the gym.

Rather than stand next to the ogre and his companions, Charlene followed and stood right beside him.

"My good people, I think there's a lesson here for all of us."

"Artie what are you doing?"

"Sh, just wait."

Artie started going on about how everyone got such a kick out of picking on the little guys.

Charlene looked on at Artie with a smile and thought 'finally'. "And maybe his first decree will be to banish everyone who ever picked on him. That's right, I'm looking at you jousting team.

"And Gwen"

Charlene looked down a bit and her smile faltered ever so slightly.

"Oh Gwen. I've always loved you. "

"Ew"

Charlene rolled her eyes at this.

"Well good friends, it breaks my heart but, enjoy your stay here in prison, while I rule the free world baby!"

"Alright let's not overdo it." The ogre came lumbering behind Charlene and her previous fear returned slightly. She looked over Artie where he was continuing his long farewell. She tried to get him to stop but gripping his shoulders but Shrek just took matters into his own hands; rather literally.

Shrek picked up Artie and left the auditorium. Charlene began to follow, grinning from ear to ear, in a near fit of giggles, but as she started to slow Arthur realized the Charlene was longer next to him so he scoffed and grabbed her hand.

"No way am I leaving you here to suffer by yourself."

Her gleaming smile was back and she happily let herself be pulled in by his strong hold.

**Alrighty then, first chapter up and finished. Not the best I know but I needed to get the story rolling here.Please let me know what ya'll think! Luckily there's a little blue button that was created to helps facilitate this task, so click people!! Thank You…**


	2. Maybe Not So Much of a Happily Ever

**Now here start the exposition scenes which can be a little tough to adapt so bear with me here. I did end up cutting and changing a fair bit from this chapter. **

Maybe Not So Much of a Happily Ever After Ending

Shrek, Puss, and Donkey were all standing with Arthur and Charlene at the helm as the former students watched their hell on earth quickly shrink to nothing on the horizon.

"I can't believe it; me, a king? I-I mean I knew I came from royalty and all but I just figured everyone forgot about me. "

Charlene came up to Artie and sweetly placed her chin on his shoulder.

"Oh no. In fact, the king asked for you personally."

Both were pleasantly surprised "Really? Wow."

Charlene laughed and put her arms around Artie "Told you"

She loosened her hold on Artie a bit and added her own part to the conversation.

"I've heard it's really not all fun and games. "

Artie couldn't help but smile. Typical sensible Char. He had her to thank really for keeping his head from imploding during school.

Shrek could tell that he would have to work to have Artie trust his judgment like he did Charlene's "It's all fun and games actually. Sure you have to knight a few heroes, launch a ship or two. By the way, make sure you hit the boat just right with the bottle."

Now both teenagers looked at Shrek like he just blurted out that 2+2 was 59.

"Boat with a bottle, any idiot can hit a boat with a bottle," they said in unison.

Shrek laughed sheepishly, "Well I've heard it's harder than it looks."

"Whoa. This is gonna be huge! Parties, princesses, castles… princesses."

Charlene gently nudged Artie to the side "Just… don't forget about the little people…. 'kay."

Artie put an arm across Charlene's shoulders, "Not a chance."

Charlene smiled again and walked down to the deck and leaned against the rail as she watched the sea pass by.

Donkey stepped over and sat down next to Arthur and started to describe all of the incredibly luxuries he would get as king.

Although Artie's smile started to fall, and fast; poison, body guards

With every word they said Artie was starting to rethink becoming the king. He looked over to where Char was peering off into the distance, suddenly hearing her voice in his head, saying that in all likelihood, not everyone would be overjoyed to have him take the thrown. Artie tried to turn his thoughts away from this but then they discovered something else. The entire kingdom would be looking to him for… well… everything. He was just a kid; he could hardly ever make it to class in one piece, forget about facing the guys that caused to problem. How could he hope to be held responsible for and maintain the lives of thousands of people?

Shrek abruptly pushed Artie behind him in the middle of the Puss' sentence and started laughing "Festering soars, hey, you are one funny kitty cat."

Puss just looked blissfully unaware of what he said

"You don't want Artie here getting the wrong idea."

Shrek looked over his shoulder and was suprised to find Arthur missing. "

"Uh… Artie"

The ship suddenly took a violent turn left, forcing everyone on board to quickly find some sort of brace.

"Artie what are you doin'!" Shrek shoved Artie away from the helm and turned the ship back on course.

"What does it look like!"

Artie grabbed a piece of wood and jammed it through the wheel, forcing the ship into another sharp turn.

Shrek lost his footing, giving Artie the chance to steer the ship back around to what the thought was the course back to **(school name)**.

Shrek came up behind Artie, pushed him to the deck, and took the helm back.

Both heirs argued back and forth about the kingship as they wrestled for the control of the helm. All the while, making the ship turn every which way, neither noticing which direction the ship was going in; leaving both Puss and Donkey to fight for their footing and Charlene bouncing back and forth from the rail and the wall of the cabin.

"Artie!" she screamed over the commotion.

"Sorry to disappoint you, but I'm going back!"

"Back to what, being a loser!"

Artie had enough and released his grip, causing Shrek to rip the helm entirely off the deck.

Now the argument turned to who was to be blamed.

Charlene finally made it up the stairs in time to hear Donkey yell.

"Shrek!"

Shrek, Artie, and Charlene all looked across the deck to see the coast and nasty rocks coming closer and closer by the second.

Shrek tried putting the wheel back in place and jerked it back and forth. It didn't work and the ship collided head on with the rocks.

--

**Seriously cut it down this time and I split the original chapter into two (felt like it was getting too long). I tried getting more of the feelings of the characters instead of the lines themselves this time and if you've seen the movie enough times there are some words or phrases that I used to help keep things in line. **

**I think that turned out pretty well, but hey, what do you think? **

**cough magical blue button cough**


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